A wireless communication technology for performing exchange of information utilizing wireless communication has been available. For example, a communication method for performing exchange of information between different information processing apparatus utilizing a wireless local area network (LAN) has been proposed. Further, as apparatus that perform exchange of information utilizing wireless communication, mobile bodies such as a portable telephone set and a smartphone are available.
Such mobile bodies frequently have a battery as a power supply. Therefore, the mobile bodies are limited in operating time. Thus, technologies for reducing power consumption have been proposed in order to extend the operating time.
For example, a technology for reducing, when a mobile body need not perform communication, the power consumption by entering a power saving state in which transmission and reception of a signal are not performed and the power consumption is low has been proposed. For example, in Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 that is a standard specification for a wireless LAN that is spread widely, a protocol for notifying a master unit that a slave unit enters a power saving state is defined. Here, it has been assumed that the master unit is linked to a fixed power supply. However, in recent years, a mobile body that is driven by a battery sometimes has a function of a base station. Therefore, a technology for reducing the power consumption by causing a base station to enter a power saving state is important.
As a technology for making it possible for a base station to enter a power saving state, a standard for allowing different Wireless Fidelity (Wi-Fi)-incorporating apparatus to be directly connected to each other by wireless connection without by way of a router has been proposed (for example, refer to NPL 1). This standard is a standard prescribed by Wi-Fi Alliance.
In this standard, protocols for allowing a wireless apparatus (group owner (GO)) that plays a role of a base station to enter a power saving state are defined. As one of such protocols, a protocol called notice of absence (NoA) is defined. This NoA indicates a procedure for notifying a slave unit of a period within which a GO is to enter a power saving state in advance using a Beacon or the like.
Further, principally for a 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP)-based system, a decision method by which a base station enters a power saving state has been proposed (for example, refer to PTL 1). According to the decision method, a base station searches for a surrounding base station that operates in synchronism with the own apparatus and decides, from an intensity and an orientation of a signal received from the surrounding base station, whether or not the own apparatus is to enter a power saving state. Since a base station that is to enter a power saving state searches for a surrounding base station in advance in this manner, a slave unit that is connected to the base station that has entered the power saving state can establish a new connection to a surrounding different base station.